Plans to radically restructure the British Army which make it more dependent
on part-time soldiers are “fundamentally flawed”, senior officers have
warned.

They spoke out as figures obtained by The Sunday Telegraph showed that the Territorial Army (TA) could be as many as 6,000 troops short by 2020 – the year when the reservists are supposed to comprise a quarter of the Army.

Last week’s decision to cut the regular Army from 100,000 to 82,000 troops, a plan known as Army 2020, is based on the TA taking an increasing role in front-line duties.

Under the restructuring, the TA will expand in number to 30,000 part-timers, and will be expected to fight in battle with the regular Army.

However, over the last two years the TA has failed to meet its recruitment targets by 20 per cent.

The TA experienced a 20 per cent shortfall in recruits in 2010-11, when 4,800 troops were required but only 3,800 joined. The same shortfall was repeated in 2011-12 when 5,100 recruits were needed but only 4,200 civilians volunteered. The TA will need to recruit around 4,000 to 5,000 troops a year for the next eight years to have a fully trained, deployable force by 2020.

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Critics of Army 2020 say the Government mistakenly bought into the idea of using reservist troops because the United States military has successfully incorporated the use of part-time soldiers, marines and pilots into the regular forces. But the US National Guard has a multi-billion pound budget, enjoys huge support from employers and provides a range of benefits for troops.

A new TA recruit is paid £35.04 a day, which rises to £43.54 once basic training has been completed. All soldiers who complete a minimum training commitment, 19 to 27 days depending on the unit, will also receive a bonus of £424.

While some TA units are run very professionally and produce high quality part-time soldiers, others have been called “drinking clubs” for aging senior non-commissioned officers. One officer said Army 2020’s flaw was that the TA “simply can’t recruit enough high-quality individuals”.

There are also concerns that businesses will be reluctant to employ reservists, in light of potentially long deployment periods.

Gen Sir John Kiszely, a former senior commander, said: “It is going to be a hell of a challenge to achieve this. You need to find enough people to double the reserve and train them to a high standard and get employers to be far more flexible about suddenly losing staff for long periods. You have to ask whether this can seriously be achieved.”

A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence said: “We don’t underestimate the challenge of achieving a trained Army Reserve of 30,000 but we are investing £1.8 billion over 10 years to enhance their capability and strength.

“In autumn we will carry out a consultation that will look at how we can create a new relationship between the Armed Forces, individual reservists and employers so it would be wrong to use past recruitment statistics to make assumptions about the future.” He said the MoD was confident more people would join the TA under the plans.